The present invention relates to methods and apparatus for the non-invasive determination of blood pressure.
Direct measurement of blood pressure with a pressure measuring device such as a tonometer is difficult in a clinical setting. A problem with tonometer readings is that although the times of the systolic and diastolic pressures are correct, the pressure readings may have an incorrect scaling or have an offset in the recorded pressure. Tonometer measurements can depend on the position of the tonometer, artery and bone structure behind the artery.
Another prior art system used to determine arterial pressures is an automated oscillometric device called a xe2x80x9cDinamapxe2x80x9d (device for indirect non-invasive mean arterial pressure). This device is described in a paper entitled xe2x80x9cArterial Pressure Monitoring: Automated Oscillometric Devicesxe2x80x9d; M. Ramsey III; Journal of Clinical Monitoring; Volume 7, No. 1; January 1991; pp. 56-67. This system uses a cuff to supply an external pressure to an artery. The cuff pressure is stepped in increments from a pressure believed to be above the systolic pressure to a pressure believed to be below the diastolic pressure. An arterial volumetric indication is monitored by the system. For example, a pressure transducer attached to the cuff will give some indication of the volume of the artery, since the pressure in the cuff will be greater when the artery volume is high. When the mean value of the arterial blood pressure is about the same as the external cuff pressure, the amplitude of the variations of the volumetric indication will be the greatest. In this way, an indication of the mean arterial pressure can be obtained. A disadvantage of this prior art system is the considerable time it takes to obtain the arterial pressure information. Many cardiac cycles are needed to obtain the data required to determine a blood pressure.
An alternative system is described in xe2x80x9cVibration Technique for Indirect Measurement of Diastolic Arterial Pressure in Human Fingersxe2x80x9d; Shimazu, et al.; Medical and Biological Engineering in computing; March 1999; Volume 27; pp. 130-136. This paper describes a method for obtaining a diastolic pressure which is somewhat similar to the oscillometric technique used with the Dinamap. In the Shimazu, et al. system, a small oscillation is placed on the cuff pressure. A plethysmograph is used to get a volumetric indication of the volume of the artery. The output of the plethysmograph will show a high-frequency component imposed on a pulsatile component. The cuff pressure is ramped or stepped in a manner similar to the Dinamap system. In the cardiac cycle where the cuff pressure is roughly equal to the diastolic pressure, the amplitude of the high-frequency component of the volumetric indication will be greater in the diastolic period of that cycle than at the diastolic period of any other cycle. In this way, the diastolic pressure can be determined. Like the Dinamap system, the Shimazu, et al. system is relatively slow. Many cardiac cycles are required to determine a single blood pressure value.
Another prior art system is described in Penàz U.S. Pat. No. 4,869,261. Penàz describes a vascular unloading system. Vascular unloading systems attempt to cause the external applied pressure to be equal to the arterial blood pressure at all times. These systems use a plethysmograph and a feedback loop in order to adjust the external pressure so that it tracks the arterial pressure. A disadvantage of this system is that, when the external pressure tracks the arterial pressure, the mean applied pressure is relatively high. For this reason, the system described in Penàz may be uncomfortable or painful to use. Additionally, vascular unloading systems tend to produce a pressure signal that is off from the real arterial pressure by a DC offset.
The systems of Palti U.S. Pat. No. 4,660,544 and Sramek U.S. Pat. No. 4,343,314 use very fast ramped external pressures. A disadvantage of these systems is that the required very fast ramped pressures may be impractical to produce. In particular, it may be difficult to use a cuff to apply the external pressures because of the relatively long periods of time required to inflate or deflate a cuff. Additionally, the quick external pressure ramp could be uncomfortable.
Therefore, it is desired to have a method and apparatus for obtaining a blood pressure that can avoid long measurement times or high applied external pressures.
The present invention is a method and apparatus for quickly determining a blood pressure value at a specific time. An external pressure is supplied to the artery so that the artery experiences a range of transmural pressures. The external pressure is set so that a known event, or marker, will occur during a measurement period. The measurement period is a short period of time that typically can be a cardiac cycle or a few cardiac cycles. The value of the external pressure at the time of the event allows for the calculation of an arterial pressure associated with the time of the event or an earlier or later time in another cardiac cycle.
By allowing a range of transmural pressures within a cardiac cycle, the transmural pressure is not clamped at zero like in the apparatus of the Penàz patent. In one embodiment, the range in the transmural pressure is mainly due to arterial pressure variations.
Examples of events, or markers, that can be detected include a peak in the arterial compliance curve at the transmural pressure about equal to zero or an opening or closing of an artery. Other markers that can be used include a pressure dependant change in attenuation of a propagating pressure wave; frequency dependent effects (i.e. level of attenuation of a propagating wave versus frequency or a compliance versus frequency relationship); changes in a compliance versus attenuation relationship; a change in the viscoelastic properties of the artery or other portion of the body; or a change in the flow of blood through the artery.
Several of the preferred embodiments of the invention use, as a marker, the peak in the compliance of the artery. The peak is, by definition, the transmural pressure (or pressure across the artery wall) where the slope of the pressure-volume relationship of the artery is the steepest. The pressure-volume relationship relates the pressure across the artery wall to the volume in the lumen of the artery. The peak in the compliance indicates that, at that transmural pressure, a given change in transmural pressure will cause a larger change in the volume of the artery than at any other transmural pressure. This peak is thought to occur at a transmural pressure of zero because the artery wall is at the least amount of stress at this pressure.
It is possible that the peak in compliance does not occur at zero transmural pressure, but rather at some transmural pressure close to zero. These slight variations could be caused by a number of factors including: arterial size, presence of disease states, age, gender, etc. The system of the present invention can produce relatively accurate blood pressure values when it assumes the compliance peak occurs at the transmural pressure of zero. If significant variations in the transmural pressure of peak compliance are found to occur, this invention would still function adequately if an appropriate compensating factor were added to the measured pressure.
The time that an event (i.e. transmural pressure approximately zero) occurs is used to produce an indication of the arterial blood pressure at a specific time. For example, if the transmural pressure is equal to zero at time T1, the system knows that the arterial pressure is equal to the cuff pressure at time T1 and/or at a different time with the same position in a subsequent or prior cardiac cycle as T1.
Within as little as single cardiac cycle, all of the data required to determine a blood pressure at a certain time can be obtained. This is much quicker than the many cycles required in the Dinamap and Shimazu systems.
The information of a blood pressure at a certain time can be used to calibrate a blood pressure signal, such as a signal from an arterial tonometer, a pressure wave velocity measurement system, or a vascular unloading device. Alternatively, it may be useful just to have any blood pressure in some situations, especially since the present invention can determine a blood pressure so quickly.
In the present invention, it is not necessary for large changes to be made to the external applied pressure. For this reason, the control of the external pressure is made easier. For example, the external pressure can be applied by a cuff which is inflated with a fluid, such as air or water, to a constant volume. The external pressure would thus be substantially constant.
Some embodiments of the present invention use the fact that there is a peak to the compliance versus pressure curve at a transmural pressure approximately equal to zero. This means that at a transmural pressure approximately equal to zero, small arterial pressure changes can cause large arterial volume changes. These embodiments preferably use an external pressure between the systolic and diastolic pressure. This external pressure can be less than the peak external pressures used in the Dinamap or Penàz systems.
One set of embodiments using this relationship uses an arterial pressure dependent signal and an arterial volume dependent signal to produce a curve of a volume indication versus a pressure indication. These embodiments are called pressure/volume embodiments. The maximum rate of change of this curve will be at a transmural pressure approximately equal to zero. Alternately, the curve can be fitted to a polynomial equation. A derivative of the polynomial equation can be obtained to get an equation that is related to the compliance. A maximum of this compliance equation would be at a transmural pressure approximately equal to zero. This means that, when the arterial pressure dependent signal has a value such that the compliance related value has a maximum, the arterial pressure is approximately equal to the externally-applied pressure. The time at which the transmural pressure is approximately equal to zero is obtainable, since the system knows the value of the pressure-dependent signal at different times.
These embodiments can also work if there is a non-linear dependence of the pressure-dependent signal or volume-dependent signal to the actual arterial pressure or arterial volume. This is because, in the present embodiment, only a maxima or maximum rate of change of a curve is required to be determined.
Examples of arterial pressure-dependent signals that can be used include a tonometer or other pressure sensors, or a system which measures the velocity of wave propagation in the artery. The pressure wave velocity is monotonically-related to the arterial pressure. Alternately, a pressure signal from a vascular unloading device could be used as a pressure dependent signal.
The volume-dependent signal can be obtained from a plethysmograph. Alternatively, the volume-dependent signal can be obtained from a pressure transducer connected to the cuff used to provide the external pressure. Increases in the arterial volume will cause the pressure within the cuff to increase. Decreases in arterial volume will cause the pressure in the cuff to decrease.
Another set of embodiments of the present invention use an exciter to put a high frequency pressure signal onto the blood pressure or the external pressure. This set of systems will then look at a volume-related signal to obtain an indication of the time that the transmural pressure is equal to zero. The input signal is at a higher frequency than the pulsatile components. The pulsatile components generally have relatively low frequencies. The volume-related signal can be filtered so that the high frequency output of the volume-related signal is obtained. The greatest amplitude of this high frequency signal will be at a point of the cycle in which the transmural pressure is equal to zero. The time within a cardiac cycle that the transmural pressure is equal to zero can be obtained with a precision that depends on the frequency of the exciter signal. The volume-related signal such as a plethysmograph can be filtered with a high-pass filter to get the high frequency component.
Another set of embodiments use a system identification approach. For example, a constant amplitude volume oscillation to the volume of the external pressure cuff can cause a volume change of the artery. A pressure indicative signal can be filtered to obtain the high-frequency component. The minimum amplitude of this high frequency component of the pressure changes would occur at the time of maximum compliance. Other alternative embodiments are also possible.
Yet another set of embodiments concern the arterial closing or opening. The arterial opening and closing will usually occur at a certain transmural pressure. A high frequency pressure signal can be sent towards an artery that has an applied external pressure. When the artery closes, the signal will be blocked and/or reflected. This means that the external pressure can be set such that within a cardiac cycle, a time can be obtained that the artery opens or closes.
Another embodiment uses a critical value associated with viscosity. Pressure wave velocity measuring system can be used to produce an indication of the attenuation of the pressure signal that is related to the viscosity. A critical value in the viscosity can be used such that by looking at the attenuation of the pressure signal an arterial pressure can be obtained.
In another embodiment, it an event can be identified in a pressure wave that propagates through tissue other than the artery, such as bones, skin, muscle, tendon, etc. For this system, the transfer function is calculated for the portion of the detected pressure wave signal that travels via paths other than the artery. The marker can be obtained by the change in the relationship between phase, amplitude and frequency, of the propagated pressure. Another embodiment of the present invention uses the existence of harmonics to determine a certain specific time at which the arterial pressure has a certain value. Non-linear transfer functions, such as the arterial-volume/transmural-pressure curve, can cause harmonics to be produced. This means that a detector using a band-pass filter set at a frequency which is a multiple of an input exciter frequency will produce a signal that can give information about a critical transmural pressure, such as the transmural pressure equal to zero.
Additionally, blood flow can be manipulated to produce a marker at a particular transmural pressure. For example, the peak flow velocity in a section of artery increases if the compliance of a distal segment of the artery were decreased. The compliance of a distal section of the artery can be changed by applying an external pressure, and would have a maximum at a transmural pressure of zero. Other changes are measured if the flow meter is placed immediately distal to the segment of the artery where the transmural pressure was manipulated. The measurements of the blood flow can be done with a Doppler flow meter.